Batman: The Grant Morrison Odyssey - The 7th Circle

Part 1: Batman & Son
Part 2: Club of Heroes/Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul
Part 2.1: Devil-Bats & The Bridge to RIP
Part 3: RIP
Part 4: The Missing Chapter/Last Rites/Final Crisis
Part 5: Batman Reborn
Part 6:Blackest Knight/Batman vs. Robin


So when we last left our intrepid heroes the enigmatic Oberon Sexton, who had been assisting Dick & Damian in their fight against The 99 Fiends, revealed himself to be none other than The Joker, but before we get to that cliffhanger we are treated to some Frazer Irving art depicting an....alternate...version of what happened with Bruce Wayne's parents were murdered.

Nice way to play with a classic Bat-image by having it be Bruce & Martha Wayne who end up dead rather than Thomas & Martha. Grant, and his various artists, do like to play on some of the classic themes of Bat-canon as I will touch upon more later.

So we also departed the previous arc with the knowledge that Dr. Hurt/Thomas Wayne/El Penitente was on his way back to Gotham and we catch back up with that story, as well as see some twisted backstory (paying Joe Chll to kill the Wayne's(?), him saying "now you'll never tell" over Martha's corpse, & in Black Glove gear pouring champagne over a demonic cat-masked woman (Catwoman allegory?) in the midst of a S&M orgy that is done in red & black colors for example), and see him returning to Gotham, claiming to be the long thought dead Thomas Wayne to the media.

Another cut to Hurt (easiest just to call him that) strolling into the scene in full Black Glove regalia, talking about how Wayne Manor & Gotham City are his, alludes to the Black Sun shining, claims to Dick that he will "break and corrupt this boy you so valiantly redeemed", referring to Damian, which makes me think of the whole "deal with the devil" Damian referred to in #666, and then...

Right underneath the painting of Thomas & Martha Wayne no less, the one that concealed the secret passageway from the previous arc. So of course we now jump 3 days back into the past where we left off with Joker's unveiling and his...confession I suppose...about what got him to this point.

Intriguing to me that Joker himself claims some kind of sanity with HIS Batman now gone, and is looking to actually help Dick & Damian, the disguise of Sexton being necessary to earn their trust. Dick lays out how he figured it out, putting together the various symbolisms of the dominoes (also known as "bones" and their container the "boneyard"), the fact that Sexton was nicknamed The Gravedigger & was drawing attention to the crimes he committed himself, the branching trails of his clues that were resemblant of The Mexican Train in dominoes, the Domino Mask symbolic of Robin (as much Joker's obsession as Batman really), they were all clues that led Grayson to the appropriate conclusion.

It's quite amusing for Dick to talk so openly to Joker about his past as Robin ("I had you figured out when I was twelve"), and I figure that actually makes sense. These are two men who have been such an intergral part of each other's lives for a long time, they know each other's secrets, and it creates this twisted bond that is something more than enemies but obviously nowhere near friendship. Oh yeah, and over in England, The Knight finds the dead body over the real Sexton, buried alive with his dead wife. Surprisingly it was Sexton who killed his wife and this was The Joker exacting his form of justice, "That was karma. One last gag..."

Gordon is nauseated that he shook hands with the Joker (as Sexton) and understandably so given how much damage he has done to Jim's life (paralyzing his daughter, murdering his wife, torturing him), and Damian is supremely suspect that "He's laughing at us! The whole thing's an act!" as Joker claims he only came back to warn them, to help. The thought of The Joker helping...hilarious...

Gordon is sick, sneezing, makes note that "The...other Batman called me 'Jim'...", again showing himself more astute about the identity of Bats than he ever lets on, and Dick still calling him Commissioner Gordon only highlights the difference in relationships and how Bruce & Dick each look at Jim. For Bruce, he is an equal, an ally on the same level while for Dick he is still someone he looks up to, someone on a slightly higher level who he highly respects. Or maybe it's just that whole being afraid of your girlfriend's dad syndrome...

Dick takes Gordon to the Bat Cave via Subway TRAIN, mentions that a solar eclipse (Hurt's black sun rise?) is impending in 3 days (you know when Hurt puts a bullet in Dick's head), and Gordon actually tells Dick that the cops prefer him to the other Batman. Not surprising given that Dick is infinitely more of a people person than Bruce, is essentially cool with everyone in the entire DCU, and doesn't feel the need to alienate even his friend's if he feels it will get a case closed quicker. Funny how he says to Gordon that "I like to think I'm just keeping the costume warm" when this whole arc of Dick as Batman has largely pointed out that perhaps Dick is the Batman that Gotham needs...

Gordon & Dick discuss the Joker, Mexican Train, Pyg, 99 Fiends, El Penitente connections in a rather relaxed fashion that would NEVER have happened between Jim & Bruce. It all loops back to the first arc with Professor Pyg though & his whole viral narcotics scheme, to which Dick pontificates if the antidote they found in Pyg's lab was just a "trojan horse", concealing the true virus...meaning a whole lot of Gotham has been infected and are totally unaware. Gordon, as this chatter continues, realizes that he just may be afflicted...

Oh yeah, and Damian is now alone with The Joker. Remember how I said Morrison liked to invert classic Bat-stuff, while here's another example:

Yup, Robin's got the crowbar now.

Turning the tables on "Death in the Family", Damian lays a beating on Joker with the crowbar, just after the clown mutters "You sound just like...like him..." (him=Bruce-Bats) to himself, and while this beating commences, things start to fall apart, symbolized by the dominoes from the beginning of the story tumbling. The flying Batmobile is blown up with Dick & Gordon in it, a legion of Dollotrons descend on the wreckage, the 99 Fiends descend on what I presume is Blackgate to unleash:

Probably the first, and only, time the twisted Professor calls anything perfect. I wonder if there's any significance to the fact that Hurt is a "Doctor" and Pyg is a "Professor"...

Alfred resets the clock that, sometimes, seems to be set to the exact moment the Wayne's died (not sure if that's still the case). Damian is still laying a beating on The Joker, looking to assault the truth out of him, and shockingly it works as Joker confesses to using all of them to get at Dr. Hurt & The Black Glove. Problem is that no one, Damian included, believes a word that Joker says, expecting every things to be a swerve, misdirection, or lie. Kind of plays into Dick's comment to Gordon in the previous issue that Joker's biggest joke would be to get them to take him seriously...

A simple scratch from Joker's envenomed fingernails doses Damian with Joker toxin, turning him into, as Joker says, "A smiling Robin! A laughing young daredevil! That's the way I like it!". In fact Joker is so amused by how well he played Damian he thinks he might be the funniest Robin yet!

I totally dig that rictus scene with Damian in an impossible looking bridge induced by his muscles all tensing up under the influence of Joker juice, but then it's topped by this completely disturbed scene...

Seriously, between this and the infamouse dance sequence, Pyg may take the cake for most disturbing character of the last decade....

So Hurt now has the Bat-Coffin in his hands, outlines to Senator Vine (who I thought he may have killed previously) exactly what Pyg's story is (former circus performer who ate light bulbs & nailed his private parts to wood apparently), and shoots a hole in a pumpkin. Okay...

The Dollotrons surrounded Gordon & the unconscious Dick Grayson as the Batmobile prepares to explode and the abort codes aren't taking. So we started this all with the creation of a new flying Batmobile so of course it must be destroyed before we're through...and as it goes kaboom we are informed that this is "day 2", meaning one more day until the eclipse & Dick's head getting shot off.

Pyg apparently injects himself with Botox as Hurt amps him up for his "performance" before the media, the mayor (who I still think is somehow in cahoots with Black Glove and Gordon did mention him being under investigation last issue), and "the cream of Gotham's underworld royalty". Pyg's response: "Je Suis Showbiz!" or "I am showbiz!" Oh yeah and then he does this...

I repeat, most disturbed character of the decade...

Pyg's viral addication is beginning to take hold on Gotham while Dick is out of it for a few hours after the explosion. He wakes up under Alfred's care, with a call from The Joker, who now has Damian in his possession, and who also provides information that something is going down with Gordon in, of all places, Crime Alley. Ya know...the place where the Wayne's died...

It looks as if Pyg & Hurt are roasting Gordon like a pig on a spit while Gotham, and more specifically Senator Vine, watch on. Now remember, since Joker has killed the rest, Vine is the last surviving member of the Black Glove save Hurt himself, so when Vine pulls a golden domino out of a popcorn box...

...guess who seems to be one step ahead of everyone else...and it certainly ain't Batman this time!

Grayson descends into the chaos, fending off Dollotrons as Gotham begins to tear itself apart under the influence of Pyg's drugs, and attempting to free Gordon. The commish, tempted by Hurt with the offer of more drugs, hits Batman in the head with a fire extinguisher, leaving him at Hurt's mercies... "Your knights have fallen and the board is mine", he screams at the fallen Bat. As for The Joker, he's sitting in The Batcave (indicated by the oversized Joker card in the background) with a nuke at his side & Damian tied up, face painted over with a clown smile.

Well that is a cover that certainly makes you wonder what's in store, especially considering all the suspicions of Hurt being The Devil & Damian's claim in ish #666 to have made a deal with the devil on the night Batman died. Wait, the night Batman died? Well we do know Dick gets shot in the head at some point....

Away from the cover and onto the interiors. The Joker, in full Oberon Sexton gear (fully pointing out that this is just another incarnation of his super-MPD), is dancing with a corpse in a wedding dress, talking to a coffin in which he has placed Damian (the 2nd person he's buried alive so far), and talking about how Dick's head is on the "devil's chopping block" (Devil=Hurt). What is Robin going to do to save his "brother" from the most evil man on Earth as Joker calls him?

Isn't he cute in the make-up & nose?

So finally the story itself catches up to where we started a few issues back as Hurt "returns" as Thomas Wayne, strolling into Wayne Manor where Alfred meeets him and the giant block letters let us know that this is DAY 3; the day of the eclipse, the day Dick eats a bullet. And, as I just learned, the last panel on this particular page (#6 of issue 15) is from the painting "The Triumph of Death"...

News reports scream of riots & quaranite in Gotham City as Pyg's virus takes hold, "Thomas Wayne" begins his move for control by going on the news claiming to know how to save Gotham, and Joker leads Damian (still tied up) through the Garden of Death at Wayne Manor.

Some more Joker wordplay that has multiple layers of meaning kicks into effect here as Damian says pawn, he turns it into prawn, he talks about "Big Mike. God's Top Gun. His Head Banana" while eating a banana. A little bit of homework tells me that "Big Mike" is a type of banana, "God's Top Gun" is a reference to Archangel Michael who led the armies of Heaven against Satan in Revelations, and the Joker continues that biblical theme by likening the banana to The Fall.

I tend to think of Morrison's comics in the same vein as good movie; nothing that makes it in a panel/scene is accidental or without purpose. Keep an eye on that banana peel is all I'm saying...

Gordon is dressed up like a Dollotron while Pyg slams what I assume is a bottle of liquor while rambling about some various imaginary doctors. Damian appears on the scene as Gordon begins to fight off the addiction, kicking Pyg, and causing an accident that throws him from the van.

Pyg, still conscious, rambles on, saying "Bless the snaile. The double is two, the deuce is snail horns, the snail is the devil". Given the Devil reference I assume he means Dr. Hurt, also using the Thomas Wayne name (two names?) but I don't really grasp the snail reference unless he's talking about Hurt being slow???

Damian attempts to take on the 99 Fiends on his own, only managing to get himself captured just in time for Dick to get shot in the head! So that's why he was shooting pumpkins, to figure out just where to shoot Grayson so as not to kill him immediately...it was target pratice!

Hurt smashes the horse on the mantle, the one that served as a sign through the years from Bruce to Dick & Damian that led them to the secret passageway, and offers Damian a deal. He will save Dick in exchange for Damian's soul...and here we have the deal that ish #666 referred to but with some differences. One, Damian said he was 14 when the deal was made and he's still 10 when this is going down. Two, in #666 Devil-Bats is still around, but at this time the man who had that identity, Michael Lane, was Azrael. Three, Damian in #666 said he made the deal to save Gotham's soul, not to save Batman's life.

That being said, #666 only serves as a possible future for Damian, one that could have happened if events had occurred a certain way. I believe that those events are occuring in a wholly different fashion now, potentially changing the mechanics of how/why Damian takes on the cape & cowl in the future, and that is something I will have to address once more when I look at #700 shortly...

Anywho, Damian tells Hurt that "You're a man who lived too long. We know who you are. You shouldn't have come back here". So the dynamic duo have figured it out definitively but the comic book hasn't caught up to them yet I'd say...but that's what Bond-villain monologues are for and of course Hurt provides us with one as his henchmen remove Thomas & Martha Wayne's picture from the wall.

Hurt again mentions the "hole" in reference to Damian's soul, explains how the Wayne's took him in & showed him kindness, and in exchange he took Thomas' face, smeared their names, destroyed their painting, and now looks to desecrate the name of Batman as well by becoming one himself, an evil one, with Damian as his Robin.

Once again the name "Barbatos" comes up, tying this to the ceremony from "Dark Knight, Dark City", as does the black sun/eclipse, while Hurt attempts to summon the demon to open the Bat-Casket. The upper right panel is similar to that of the cover posted earlier...which is also similar to the bottom-center panel of this page from Detective Comics #38 that introduced Robin:

Again with that inversion of classic Bat-Images...

There's a whistle which is the lost-langage of the Miagani Tribe (the ones that worshipped Barbatos), the Bat-Coffin opens for the first time in 100 years (according to Hurt), and inside, along with a batarang/signal is a note & all it says... "GOTCHA!", the same words Bruce said right before he was Omega Sanctioned into time by Darkseid. Hurt is shocked, and as for Dick & Damian...

DOUBLE PUNCH!!!!

Hurt is freaking out, the 99 Fiends break into the scene, Dick and Damian smile as the former Robin says "I don't make plans, but I know someone who does. Devil...meet Bat-God"

Guess who's baaaaaaaack.....

So how the hell did Bruce get from being blasted by Darkseid's Omega Beams to standing inside Wayne Manor ready to kick Dr. Hurt's ass? Well that my friend's is a story for the NEXT blog as I look at "Batman: Return of Bruce Wayne" and Batman & Robin #16!!!

But before we wrap up here, largely because I intially couldn't seem to fit it anywhere else, I need to look at the story in Batman #700 Morrison wrote that was included in the "Time and the Batman" HC along with "The Missing Chapter" and a Fabian Nicieza Bat-story.

Man I dig that cover...

So this was a rather interesting look at three different eras of Batmen (well rather like 6 but more on that in few) as Morrison does a multi-angled tale with Bruce, Dick, and Damian all wearing the cape & cowl at various points.  All three tales center around a Professor Nichols and his Maybe Machine which apparently induces something he calls "time hypnosis" which lets the user see "...visions of how things might have been". Nichols is a perfect example of Morrison's love for using characters & stories from the 40's & 50's and molding them into a modern context, placing them in true continuity.

The first story with Bruce & Dick (as Robin) is set in the past, and as you can see from the image above, in a look straight out of the 60's, the "New Look" era as it's called, complete with the faux-Mad Hatter (NOT Jervis Tetch, rather a guy who impersonated him for several years in the books).  This guy was sane, just really like hats, and certainly not the potential pedophile that Tetch sometimes is portrayed as.

The thing I find the most interesting about a look at this era of Bat-history is, not surprisingly, The Joker.  It's been noted several times over on numerous websites how The Joker changed during the reign of the Comics Code from a psycho murderer to a more "fun" villain and I suppose this is Morrison actually writing that personality change into continuity over the course of the first 3rd of this story.

He does jump from a giggly mess to a sweaty, shaky mess to a sadistic guy channeling Heath Ledger as he threatens to "...put a big cheeky smile on that baby face...", talking about Robin.  It's also cool how Morrison actually puts a time-stamp on this story as Joker looks through his Jokebook (allusion to Batman's Casebook?) and mentions how he might look into "Joker fish".  FYI: check out "Detective Comics #475 for that one.

So he smokes Fear Gas from a pipe, gives Robin a hit of it, but in the process Batman uses the distraction to free himself and lay a whooping on the villains.  Not sure why Bruce gets so pissed when Riddler calls him Caped Crusader but he certainly won't do that again...

Gordon bursts in with the cops following a tip-off from Professor Nichols himself (very curious since he stated earlier he was only expecting Bats & wouldn't have made a chance to make this call being surrounded by villains and all), and Robin wonders at the paradoxes of time travel that come along with every story of the sort.  What would happen if The Joker had accomplished his goal of stopping Batman from ever coming into existence?

For that matter, now that I think about it, that pretty much implies Joker suspects Bats identity & what birthed him...which is basically what we know from "RIP" amongst other stories, it's just that by then he doesn't care, believing Batman to be the true face and anything else a mask.

Off to the present day with Dick now in the Batman role & Damian-Robin as they return to the same scene as the previous chapter, Prof. Nichols basement lab, only now he's an old dead man.  In fact he's about 20 years older than he should be according to Grayson, but let me take one step back real quick like before we move on to point out the little differences...

Seriously could you ever see Bruce doing that?  I mean it is very likely he would remember all that information, but extremely unlikely he would actually talk to the officer in the same fashion as Dick.  Probably one of the reasons Gordon said his cops preferred him to the other Batman...and I've got a sneaking suspicion about Officer Bailey's kid but that comes back later in this story.

Damian off-handedly mentions "no case unsolved tonight", Dick mentions how he was hoping to contact Nichols to help find Bruce (essentially giving me a chronological reference for when this story takes place, between B&R #9 & #10 I'd say, and then we head to Park Row.

As is well known this is the place where Bruce's parents were killed, and now Dick is bringing Damian here to commemorate the anniversary in Bruce's stead.  Dick lays down a black wreath, claiming that's what Bruce does every year, but I could swear that he's been depicted putting down two red roses most times.  This anniversary is also the reason for the "no case unsolved tonight" comment earlier...

Some bad stuff starts to go down which gives us a wonderful little throwback to the first issue of "Batman & Robin" (oh yeah, Frank Quitely is drawing this section which I forgot to mention, Tony Daniel did the first):

I love his fight sequences like this...

Dmian & Dick run into Lone-Eye Lincoln, the guy who Bruce almost bought drugs from back in "RIP", and he agrees to keep his business quiet for the night in exchange for Dick fending off...The Mutants...a reference to the gang that runs shit in Frank Miller's "The Dark Knight" in case you don't know.  BTW, it also seems there's a one-off panel during the Pyg-induced drug riot in "Batman & Robin" that shows Lincoln helping people in trouble.  I guess his genorousity stems from this moment...

Dick & Damian do some hero-work around Gotham, break-up a villainous auction being led by the faux-Hatter (now Hatman), where he's trying to sell The Joker's Jokebook (after already selling Red Hood's guns & Kite-Man's kite collection).   They break that up, Damian of course brags about all the reasons he should be Batman instead of Dick, which leads Grayson to point out the story behind the "Locked Room Killer" as they are referrring to Prof. Nichols death. 

For some reason Damian's comment about Dick's "...insane leaps of logic..." and Grayson's "It'll all make sense one day" somehow seem like Morrison doing meta-commentary on his own writing...or maybe I'm just looking for things that aren't there. Apophenia I believe it's called, something The Joker mentioned to Bats in "RIP"...

Off to the future of Batman #666, once again drawn by Andy Kubert, where Damian serves as Batman, currently in pursuit of a Max Roboto (guy named Max with cyborg body parts to compensate for, say perhaps his natural body not working, could this be son of the police officer Dick talked to?). Just to show you how much more of a heartless prick Damian is than his predecessors, he leaves Max to be eaten by rats after getting the necessary info out of him.

So it's a dude named January Damian is in pursuit of and he has seeded the skies with Joker Venom, creating rain that infects Gotham's population with a non-lethal variant of the juice.  Again we see Commisioner Barbara Gordon allowing her to reinforce the idea that she hates Damian just before Damian uses his father's satellite program Brother I (the one that helped create "Infinite Crisis") to take out (read "kill") some Jokerized/Venomized monsters in cop uniforms.

Damian gets to his destination, January, and finds this:

A man who looks like an even more insane version of Two-Face sits with Professor Nichols (the 80 year old, laser hole in the chest version) at his side & a Jokerized baby on his knee.  This bizarro Two Face reads like a conglomerate of multiple Bat-Villains with the use of Joker Juice, Monster Serum, the coin, & calendar dates, except he's not good at it.  He thought he kidnapped a twin but Damian informs him he screwed the pooch on that one.

Damian takes him out, is approached by the Carter Nichols from the Bruce-Bats story who tells him he needs to go back in time to tip-off the police, as well as drop off his old man body in the Grayson-Bats story.  Damian seems to have some memory of what's going on here, based on his comment of "That door was...locked..." and "I can't let you...kill yourself.", sound more like his kid-self than his uber-bad ass persona.  He also drops some names when he contacts Commish Gordon, informing her to tell Warren & Mary McGinnis their baby's safe, then reading the note from Nichols that repeats something Riddler said earlier, "What can we beat but never defeat?"

In case you are unaware, that baby is none other than Terry McGinnis, the Batman of Batman Beyond, which turns Morrison's story in this issue into a new creature if you ask me. Follow me for a moment: IF "Batman Beyond" continuity is intact as it happened in the TV show & movie, then both Terry McGinnis and Tim Drake were infected with Joker venom (see "Return of The Joker" for more info on Drake), which is quite interesting to me.  Still, in true Beyond continuity it is Bruce who mentors Terry, but it would seem more likely given this panel:

I imagine it's now Damian serving as the mentor in Morrison's official Bat-Continuity, although still Bruce Wayne in DC Animated world.  We are then presented with multiple looks at Batman thru the ages...

Brane (from the year 3000 & Batman #26), maybe another Brane (from the year 3050 & Batman #67), and the DC One Million Batman (created by Morrison for the DC One Million mini-series)....what is it that we can defeat but never beat? 

Two things: Time and The Batman...

Next blog: A whole lot of time and Batman!

Batman: The Grant Morrison Odyssey Part The First

For months, longer actually, essentially as long as I have been writing this blog I have wanted to sit down and re-read Grant Morrison's Batman epic...narrative...saga, whatever your noun of choice may be, and take a look at how it all links together one Hardcover chapter at a time.  First I figured I would just take it from the starting point contained within the above book and run it through to "Batman: RIP".  Then that changed to waiting until Grant's run on "Batman & Robin" was completed, which thus gave way to waiting for "Batman Inc." to wrap up its tale. 

Now given that I will likely be waiting until the end of time for this "Leviathan" story to actually come to a close, assumptions based solely on the asinine delays in getting the last two issues of "Batman Inc." released, combined with the simple fact that the old DC is "dead" in large part, and that the initial phase of "Leviathan" wrapped with the recently released "Leviathan Strikes" book, I have decided that this is my cue.  It is finally time to sit-down and peruse these tomes once again and follow the white rabbit from issue to issue to see how Bruce & his Bat-family go to where they were when Grant's story closed in "Strikes".  I did this as a play-by-play via twitter while I was reading, which kind of gave me some bullet points, this is the long form version.

So to quote what was apparently the most annoying movie quote text alert sound in history (based on the audience approval of friends & family), "Here we go..."

One Batman shooting Joker in the face while another swoops in from overhead just moments after Jim Gordon has been tossed off a rooftop, his face contorted in the stylized smile of The Joker, while "a bunch of  vulnerable, disabled kids" look while the Bat-signal sits there cracked, and the clown prince of crime has apparently killed Batman with an all-too familiar weapon of choice: a crowbar. All that goes down in the span of only 5 pages...welcome to the world of Batman as seen through the eyes of Grant Morrison and brought to life by Andy Kubert, Jesse Delperdang, and more.  This world, as the story unfolds over the course of several years, turns out to be an intertwining, crazy ride where even the most minute of details could have later meaning or significance.  For example:

It seems so trivial, that the spray paint covering the walls, and it would likely be so in the hands of most other writers.  Spray paint in comics has a tendency towards inside jokes, shout outs to other creators, or tags for in-story gangs, but in this case with "Zur en arrh" it is none of the above. It is seemingly gibberish, but when you look closely at just the page above, as well as the proceeding one, you will notice that it is gibberish that is everywhere.  Be it a wall or the dumpster in which Bats throws The Joker's body, look and you will see "Zur en arrh" in 3 out of the 6 panels that make up these 2 pages. Is there meaning it?  Time will tell...

I'm not looking to do a page-by-page here but there are moments on most of them that are worth mentioning, whether be overarching importance, or simply something...simple...that I appreciate.  The hospital scene between Bats & Gordon that follows the Joker encounter is interesting to me for two main reasons, the first being Jim asking "What do you do now, Batman?" in reference to his locking up essentially every major criminal in Gotham save Two-Face, and the second being that as Gordon references Harvey Dent, his face (well recovering from the Joker toxin) actually LOOKS like Two-Face!

Alfred encouraging Bruce to go out and BE Bruce Wayne is great because it had been awhile prior to this, maybe since the "Murderer/Fugitive" debacle (fuzzy memory), that this issue had been addressed. It's a constant pull; this dual identity, which is the reality and which the fiction, so I always appreciate when it gets injected into the storyline.  Also, it is a rarity in ANY comics that the actual sound of a character's voice is every mentioned (if they're gruff, whiny, baritone, etc) so as a result I actually appreciate Alfred referencing the growl of Batman's voice...and how it has essentially become Bruce's voice as well.  There's also moments such as the once below that seem rather innocent, pointless even, but if I learned anything from film classes, and from reading Morrison as much as I do, it is that very little of what sees print is meaningless or accidental.

The work Alfred puts into actually teaching Bruce how to be Bruce Wayne again is endearing, showcasing the familial relationship between the two that, although we know it exists, it is something that should be refreshed every so often, and it helps to demonstrate that Mr. Pennyworth is much more than just a butler. 

Always been a fan of Man-Bat due to the animated series so great to see the Langstrom's brought into play, especially seeing Kirk as the genius scientist he actually is instead of just as the mindless beast. The art show charity function is amazingly drawn, colored, and lettered with great little touches such as a painting of a crying woman saying "I'm in love." hanging over Bruce's head while he hits on three women simultaneously.  And then the big close of chapter one, the first step of the big reveal, a young child in shadow pointing at a monitor with the face of Bruce Wayne on it and saying the words, "That's my father." with Talia Al Ghul's hand on his shoulders, and a legion of Ninja Man-Bats hanging over their heads! WTF?!?!?

And that's how we kick off part two of this arc, introducing a woman who would have a grand effect on the lives of Bruce Wayne & Batman: Jezebel Jet.  Jet's appearance is so brief that you wouldn't expect it to carry much weight, but there is something in the way she departs, telling Bruce "Don't worry. I know where you live." that carries sinister barring in retrospect. Now back to the balloons! 

That word balloon floating over her head reading "WOW!" is exactly what I was talking about with the way the art of the exhibit is intertwined into the action playing out before us.  It's a grand way to make your "background" something more, something alive if you will, and it plays throughout the entire fight with the Ninja Man-Bats. A painting reading "Yikes!" as they crash through the ceiling, another screaming "Ouch!" as Bats punches a Ninja-Bat in the face, a giant "BLAM!" on another as Batman fires a grappling line, and an Andy Warhol style Wonder Woman painting watching the fight unravel...I'm just amazed at the use of background to tell a story in this chapter.  The numbers overcome Bats, he wakes up a hostage for Talia & her Ninja-Bat army, and we get a little insight into what this all about...a little tryst she & Bats had in the desert back in the (until this very moment) non-canon "Son of the Demon" story:

Bringing the non-canon into active continuity....interesting, and it also brings us to our first look at a character who may have ranked amongst the most hated in all of comics for his first few years: the appropriately named Damian Wayne:

The next chapter revolves around Damian's introduction to Alfred, Tim Drake, and the Wayne Manor and to say it does not go well would be an understatement.  This chapter also makes it very easy to understand why Damian was so easy to hate in his early days...he's a little prick, a child raised with no restraint, taught to murder, and told he would one day rule the world.  Of course he's a total bastard!
What's really intriguing for me about this issue is that, aside from maybe 5 pages, the whole of the story takes place in the mansion, the exception being a brief couple page scene where Bats leaves Damian locked in his room to go stop some criminals only to find one of them beheaded.  Prior to that little fight though I appreciate the Bruce-Damian-Tim interactions; how Bruce seems to be handling Damian they way he likely remembers his father coping with him if/when Bruce acted out. It doesn't work, what does seem to work is Bruce talking at him like a drill seargent/sensei handing an unruly solider/student.  Damian is also plays Tim Drake perfectly, where Tim approaches him like a normal child, severely underestimating the kid, while Damian comes at Tim with aggression and intolerance, provoking a fight by unveiling a severed head in a bag, calling Tim a surrogate son, and mocking him for being adopted.  Oh yeah, and then Damian steals a Robin wardrobe and meets Dad on the rooftops, closing this chapter with the following image:

The image of a beaten Tim isn't what's important to me here, it's the case sitting to the left of his unconscious body.  I may be wrong, and I may be reading into things, but that certainly looks like a certain Bat-inspired Thomas Wayne costume that rears its head later in Morrison's tales.

The last chapter of "Batman & Son" is the big, bad fight against Talia & her legion of Man-Bats but reading it closer, I realized there's a lot more going on than that.  This is the chapter that actually sets the stage for Leviathan several years later and it is so inoccuous that the only way to notice is to have read that "Batman Inc" story and then go back to this one.  This chapter also offers great insight into the relationship between Talia and her son, as well as Bruce & Damian.  There are moments of child-like behavior in Damian during the all-too brief period before the arrive at Gibraltar, like the way Kubert draws Damian's face as he tell's Bruce where his mom is hiding out at.  It screams of a desperate desire for his father to approve, particularly when combined with the "See? I can be useful!" proclamation Damian makes as he tells his father.  The smile as he takes off in a rocket with his father, the brief banter during their flight from the Manor to Gibraltar, even his "Do I have to choose? I would much rather we were all togther." line in the closing pages offers some insight into where Damian's head is truly at, and shows some layers beyond the spoiled brat of a child.  There is obviously more to the Damian story than this, and reading closely I can see the foundation of Leviathan being laid out by Talia in the two panels on page 101 where Talia states "Then it's war. And you're responsible...For people like us, the world is the gameboard, and nations are pawns."

Then they all go boom...and it's time for the strangest single issue of a Batman book I have ever read: "The Clown At Midnight"

This is not a comic book, not in any traditional sense of the style, rather it is a prose-piece with some art that is so intricate and gorgeously rendered that it blew my mind.  I think I read this book three time on the day it was first released, in part to truly grasp just what the hell was going on, and in part to take in all the little details worked into the pages.  There are not traditional comic book panels, no flow of words and art necessarily, but some powerful images nonetheless.  One thing I had never noticed before until my re-read of the HC collection is how the actual background contain images all their own, images that simply look like fog but are in truth the faces of mad clowns looming over as the Batmobile enters Arkam Asylum grounds,  as well as in the "Her Special Day" and "Nirvikalpa Samadhi" chapters, and there is text in the background of the "Joker Unbound" chapter, right below the image of The Joker spitting venom into the guard's face, but it's text that I cannot make out for the life of me.  The detail in the images, both prominent and those hidden, is excellent but detail isn't reserved for simply the art. 

The prose scripted by Morrison borders on Hawthorne levels of description in some instances but it gives a life to Gotham City in "The Knight and the City" chapter and gives depth to Solomon & Sheba in their respective chapters that they obviously never had when first introduce (and summarily forgotten about) in "The Killing Joke". In fact, that is a facet of Morrison's work in the Bat-books thus far that is often overlooked.  He manages to give personality, life, to characters that otherwise have none.  The bats in the Batcave in "Batman & Son" are given some identity in their food preferences, the usually faceless & nameless cronies of The Joker are given a sense of self in the "Putting Bozzo to bed" chapter of this story, as are the security guards of Arkham Asylum in those sections.  Even The Joker is given an identity via Morrison, a "superpersona" that explains the constant variations on his character over the years, again showcasing Grant's desire to make everything that has ever happened in the world of Batman be logical and to have some meaning. 

My favorite two scenes in this story are the initial Harley scene in "The Checkerboard Doll" chapter in which the following dialogue takes place:
 "You tried to kill him! You shot him," she works out.
"I didn't shoot him," the Batman is telling her."That was someone else."
"Batman shot him!" her voice is becoming shrill, agitated, and distracted. "And you're Batman, aren't you? Dressed up like that?" Her gaze zigzags around the room as her muscles shift under her costume, making the checkerboard ripple.
"I don't use a gun, Harley." Batman says. She seems to return from a dream and focuses on him with a bellowing snarl. "YOU USED A GUN ON HIM!"
"That wasn't me," he says again, hut he's wasting his time and Sheba's time.
"So now you're NOT Batman?" She can hardly believe his audacity.
"Of course I am."
"ARE YOU TRYING TO SAY I'M MAD?"

Identity, Batman versus Bruce Wayne, there's only one Batman....all of these things come into play during that brief dialogue. My other favorite moment is the description of The Joker's "change" that is laid out in the "Joker Unbound" chapter.  His body physically changing, his voice cracking, his brain racing as his newest persona takes hold and we finally get the unveiling of this:

The Thin White Duke of Death, The Clown At Midnight, just two of the names that have been bandied about to label this itteration of The Joker and both are apt.  In addition to this unveiling, the pieces of the puzzle truly come together when Harley Quinn gets to Arkham.  This whole story has been about The Joker eliminating any connections to his previous personas, hence killing off the clowns at the funeral and going after Sheba as well, and now it is Harley's turn to die at the stroke of midnight right in front of the Bat, and she was going to let him...

This whole sequence almost makes you feel bad for Harley, although she is the one to put the bullet in The Joker's shoulder that stops him from leaving Arkham before midnight as she utters the words, "Don'tcha love me no more?" and wipes a tear from her eye.

In addition to being a very ambitious and daring story for a mainstream comic, this story also introduced several plot points, themes, & motifs that would prove to play out over the long haul of Morrison's Bat-Story including the red & black motif, the new Joker juice variation, Joker's desire for Batman to finally get the joke, and this quote, "Life and death. The joke and the punchline." which I am pretty makes a reapperance in the DCU #0 issue, but I'll have to wait until I hit "Batman RIP" again to be certain.

And that brings us to the final three issues of this volume, two that are tied together, and one that is distinctly seperate from everything that comes before yet, yet intimately tied to everything that the future will bring.  We start with Grant taking a dip into the ocean of history once more in "Three Ghosts of Batman", but before we delve into that, it is the return of Jezebel Jet as Bruce parachutes onto a mountain top to meet her skiing, "accidentally" causes a helicopter to crash, and then hits the town for dinner with his newest prospect. 

We hit the streets of Gotham once more with a gaggle of call girls and their pimp trying to deal with the police as someone is killing the girls, someone who turns out to be a cop, but a "Monster on smack" as one of the girls calls him.  Also, as Bats comes crashing back down into his real world of the Gotham City alleyway, you will once more notice a plethora of "Zur en arrh" tags on every wall surrounding him.

The monster cop Bats confronts looks like like Bane in a Bat-uniform, but somehow juiced up even worse, and it harkens back to the man dressed as Batman that began this whole HC, the one that shot Joker, who also happened to be a cop and as Bats puts it "a series of locks open up in my head".  Unfortunately...and unusually...he proves quite distracted, lost in thought about this Black Casebook, leaving Bats open for this:

Battered, beaten, and bloodied, one of the hookers helps Bats to a safehouse where he passes out and dreams of Damian telling him "The third ghost is the worst of them all" only to awaken to find Alfred & Tim caring for him.  What I appreciated most in this scene was Morrison's acknowledgment of fear in Bruce as he flashes back to Bane breaking his back, enhanced by Alfred informing him that the spinal brace in the costume was shattered.  It is rare that Bruce shows fear and it happens once more in these scene as Tim goes off to battle the "ghost" himself, perhaps harkening back to his other primary fear: having another Robin die.

The next scene between Alfred & Bruce finally tells us what The Black Casebook is all about, and also give Morrison a chance to take all the crazy antics that happened to Batman during his life-span and wrap them up in a bow.  All the sci-fi, supernatural, inexpliciable cases chalked up to Joker Toxin & Fear Gas exposure in massive cumulative doses...which leads Bruce into explaining the three versions of himself including one with a gun, a bestial strength enhanced version, and one who sold his soul to the devil & destroyed Gotham.    Obviously we are dealing with the second one...

Combined Bats & Robin beat him, leading to a conversation between Gordon & Bats I find interesting simply for the closing dialogue when Gordon asks, "Why did you have to choose an enemy that's as old as time and bigger than all of us, Batman?" to which he responds, "Same reason as you did, Jim. I figured I could take him. This isn't over."  Doesn't seem like much on its own but in light of the overreaching story arc of good vs. evil, it reads wholely differently than it did years ago.

Also, I find something in the scene of an obviously battered Damian having his organs harvested and replaced.  Whether it is an allusion to a future scene in "Batman & Robin" may entirely be in my own  head, but else is literature if not open to interpretation?

Oh yeah, and Brucie Boy finally opens his heart up to another woman, one not in a cat costume, whilst someone in black gloves holding a pair of binoculars watches them.  End scene, leading to the final part of this collection, issue 666, the future tale known as "Bethlehem":

This is a story set in some future time where Damian is all growed up and has taken on the Mantle of the Bat.  Aside from a quick backstory double-pager, the reader gets tossed right into the thick of it as Damian battles Dollotrons, crucifies Professor Pyg, and then goes home to see his kitty cat Alfred.  Obviously we didn't know this at the time...but this would mark the first apperance of characters that will be a major part of "Batman & Robin" in the years to come.  Damian talks about the last of the three Batman who thinks he's the Anti-Christ, makes reference to his own bargain on the night Batman died, name drops several other villains, and pops pills.  Barbara Gordon, now the Commish, alludes to Damian being responsible for the death of a friend, and then we get introduced to this 3rd Batman who wears a costume that is now all too familiar:

At this point it's a fresh look, but in the months to come it is a visual we will see again, and since it doesn't really crop up again in Grant's run, I want to address the significance of what Damian said about this 3rd Batman.  Damian stated that this Devil-Bats believe he is the Anti-Christ coming to judge Gotham; well as we know now, this costume was worn by Michael Lane until the close of the "Batman: RIP" arc, at which point he aimed to repent, became the new Azrael, and donned the Suit of Sorrows (to be addressed in "Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul") along with a pair of swords.  Well to make a badly drawn, unimpressive story shorter, Lane went nuts again after finding out he was somehow releated to Jesus Christ and tried to destroy Gotham. Hopefully that is an accurate description, my memory of the book isn't the clearest because it was drivel, and it also appears no one on the internet bothered to chronicle Lane's fate much past him first becoming Azrael either.

I bring that all up wondering if this future Devil-Batman is still Michael Lane, or if what goes down in "Batman & Robin" effectively changes this from ever happening?  What happened in "B&R" you ask? Well you will have to wait until I get there! Manical laugh...manical laugh...manical laugh...

Back to the story itself and in the wrap-up we get a cameo from Flamingo (another "B&R" villain making his true first appearance), a reference to Dick Grayson's time as Batman, and Damian basically telling Devil-Bats that he's a cheater because he's not as good as Dick or Bruce at the role.  Oh yeah, and another reference to some deal Damian made with the Devil, or the son of Satan, when he was 14 to guarantee Gotham's survival.  Curious...and with a snapping of Devil-Bats neck, and nice closing line:

...we get the close of the "Batman & Son" HC collection, and what a ride it has been!  The mystery of "Zur en arrh", the secret behind the 3 Ghosts of Batman, the "new" Joker, Jezebel Jet, Damian's future, and the big question of just when that new Batmobile is going to be ready?!?!  There was a lot of groundwork laid out in this first chapter for the years of material to come. 

Whether it was all planned out in advance, came together as it was being written, or whether Grant retroactively used his past stories to establish a foundation for present work, it all comes together quite nicely.  It amazes me that a simple pair of panels from a story done in 2006 work as foreshadowing for a story hitting print at the end of 2011. 

I am sure there are things in this volume that may not perfectly work in the larger scheme of things, as I am sure that will be the case going forward, but that's what intrigues me in doing this.  Finding the connections, the hidden material I never noticed before, or even making my own bonds from story to story that were never intended but work in my reading of the material. 

Next time out: "The Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul" & "The Black Glove" collections....